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- The field is played out: in 2025, the demand for Russian projects increased
The field is played out: in 2025, the demand for Russian projects increased
In 2025, there was a noticeable increase in demand for video games created by Russian or Russian-speaking developers. Thus, the peak monthly audience of the VK Play platform, specializing in domestic projects, has grown from 12 to 19 million users. The trend is also noticeable in the world: in 2025, many of our games with over 500,000 copies were released on the Steam platform. Among the sales leaders are No, I'm Not a Human, Zemsky Sobor, Russ vs Lizards. Whether the trend will continue in 2026 is in the Izvestia article.
Russian games have become a trend
In Russia and the world, projects created by domestic studios or Russian-speaking developers have become more active. As reported to Izvestia in VK Play, the peak monthly audience of users who included games on the platform increased from 12.5 million in 2024 to 19 million in 2025, while the record was set in October.
Screenshot from the Zemsky Sobor game
— This year, everyone heard about the "Troubles" and its sequel, the Zemsky Sobor. They really aroused the interest of the players, as we can see from the internal metrics. But besides that, VK Play has a lot of games from Russian developers that have resonated with demanding gamers and ensured such an audience growth. Russian studios have always been good at strategic and tactical games, so the releases of Broken Arrow and The Leading Edge aroused interest not only from the VK Play audience, but also from the global community. "Song of the Spear" and Twilight Wars have become less well—known, but also high-quality games in this direction," said Alexander Zhiganov, Director of Strategy at VK Play.
According to the speaker, 2025 was especially rich in releases that left a mark not only among Russians, but also outside the country. Among them: "Saturn", which is suitable for fans of science fiction, "Famously One-Eyed" with immersion in the frightening world of folk beliefs and comparable to the acclaimed hit Atomic Heart Hail to the Rainbow from single author Sergei Noskov.
— As for the potential outside of Russia and the CIS, I believe in projects such as Cyberslav, Bylina or Tsarevna. Unlike games that are strongly tied to a specific historical agenda, there is no ideology or complex local context that would be incomprehensible to an outside audience. There is a distinctive world, interesting ENT, characters and visual style. It is precisely such things that are well perceived abroad as something new and unusual, as happened with Atomic Heart at the time," said Vladimir Tolmachev, CMO of the Plus Gaming service.
Screenshot from the Epic game
Such games are understandable and close to the audience in Russia and the CIS, but they can also be interesting to the international market due to the original gameplay and fresh look. These are full-fledged, high-quality games with a neat Slavic slant that does not look strange or intrusive, but rather makes the world more vivid and memorable, the speaker noted.
What other games were bought in 2025
The RuStore press service said that Russian projects remain the leaders of the gaming segment on the platform.
The leading game genres are simulators with a share of 13%, action — 11%, puzzles — 10%, casual games — 8%, RPG — 7% and shooters — 6%. The top games by downloads were led by Tanks Blitz, "The World of domovyat" and Black Russia — all these games were created by Russian studios.
According to Dmitry Pankrushev, the store's head, the site is actively expanding opportunities not only for Russian, but also for foreign companies. So, by November, Chinese developers had earned 3.5 times more than in 2024.
The Wildberries & Russ press service noted that in the past year, PC games showed the highest dynamics, sales increased by 212 and 282%, respectively, but at the same time, sales are low in absolute terms. Thus, sales of the Russian hit Atomic Heart in physical terms increased by 13% in 2025.
— The turnover of video games on Wildberries in 2025 increased by a third in terms of sales and by 50% in physical terms. PlayStation 5 discs are most often bought, with an increase of 46% in total and 54% in physical terms. Football simulators FC25 and FC26 from EA Sports for the PlayStation 5 platform have always been a hit of sales," the company noted.
According to Sergey Mezin, head of the M.Video Games and Gaming Community Development department, the year 2025 once again confirmed the genre preferences of Russians in the console media market — GTA V, sports simulators and adventure games with deep plot development are traditionally in the top sales.
Screenshot from the Mafia game: The Old Country
— Despite moderate critical ratings, Mafia has shown good results in our sales channels: The Old Country, among the releases of 2025, it ranks second after EA Sports FC 26. Death Stranding 2: On the Beach is in third place in terms of revenue among the new products of the year, followed by Ghost of Yotei, Clair Obscure: Expedition 33 and Kingdom Come: Deliverance II," the specialist added.
According to the MTS Fog Play gaming platform, in 2025, the greatest interest of Russian users was focused on the genres of action and adventure — they account for about 55% of all sessions. In terms of total time spent in games, Cyberpunk 2077 became the leader — it accounted for about 4.6% of the total gaming time on the platform, Ilya Tselikov, director of cloud gaming at MTS, told Izvestia.
Dmitry Kruglov, an expert in the gaming industry, stressed that there is a trend in the popularity of Russian games in the world. However, instead of the Zemsky Sobor, the international audience preferred the strategy of Broken Arrow, horror No, I'm Not a Human, action films Russ vs Lizards 2 and Escape from Tarkov. Almost all of them showed sales growth (over 500 thousand copies), while in 2024 only Warhammer 40,000: Space Marine 2 showed comparable dynamics.
Screenshot from the game Russ vs Lizards 2
— Let me remind you that in 2026, the projects "Off-Road Commanders" from Foxhound and "War of the Worlds: Siberia" from 1C Game Studios are expected to be released. These are ambitious games by Russian teams, competitive in their genres and comparable to their foreign counterparts. There are no guarantees of a repeat of the 2025 figures, including on Steam, but the release schedule looks encouraging. There will definitely be something to keep track of," noted IT columnist Sergey Pomortsev.
According to him, the interest of foreign gamers is not related to the "Russianness" of projects, which is often invisible, but to the fact that the key games of the year have become successful in their niches and have found an audience. The main factors are identity and originality, and the domestic gaming industry has no problems with this, he concluded.
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